In midterm after midterm after midterm after midterm, Democrats have done an extraordinary job of suppressing (more like repressing, in a psychoanalytic sense) their own vote. Florida Democrats excel at being mediocre stewards of democracy when there’s a governor’s race.

That’s doubly true if you’re a South Florida Democrat.

Look no further than the Tuesday primary.

Fewer than 840,000 of nearly 4.6 million registered Democrats cast their ballots in the primary — an 18.2 percent turnout — in which Crist beat longtime Democrat Nan Rich by a whopping 48.7 percentage points.

August 30, 2014

President Bill Clinton will use his star power to ramp up support for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist on Friday in Miami.

The rally will be held at 6 p.m. at the J.W. Marriott Marquis hotel. Members of the public who wish to attend must RSVP at www.charliecrist.com/bill-clinton-sept5.

In announcing the event, Crist said he was "over the moon." Here is more from an email to supporters:

"President Clinton's been fighting on the front lines for years on the issues we care about: Equal pay for women, raising the minimum wage, expanding health care to everyone who needs it, and making sure that everyone has a fair shot at success.

He's better than anyone at explaining why what we're doing matters.

I'm looking forward to kicking off the final two months of this campaign with him."

"The voters will have a clear choice between candidates in this election and they deserve to hear directly from us on the distinct difference in visions and leadership that each candidate will offer," the email stated. "This can be accomplished through thoughtful and respectful dialogue worthy of our great state."

While celebrating with supporters at a Tallahassee wine bar, Sheldon accepted, and then some.

"I'll debate her five times if she's up for it."

To emphasize that, Sheldon's campaign blasted its challenge to Bondi on Friday: Five debates over the next two months.

"The choice of attorney general every four years deserves more than one debate," Sheldon concludes in an open letter to Bondi.

By Friday afternoon, it wasn't clear if Bondi would debate that many times. Her campaign has at least $4.2 million to spend, while Sheldon, financially exhausted after a primary battle against Rep. Perry Thurston, D-Fort Lauderdale, has about $50,000. In a state where candidates need TV air time to win, debates are a valuable way to make up ground lost in campaign finances.

“We’re glad that Attorney General Bondi’s opponent has accepted her request to debate the issues. Our teams will be in contact to work out the details in the coming weeks,” said Bondi's campaign spokesman, Trey Stapleton.

Tallahassee lawyer Steven R. Andrews expanded his public records complaints against Gov. Rick Scott and Attorney General Pam Bondi on Friday, asking the court to hold the state's top officers in violation of the state's public records laws and seeking relief and attorneys fees.

He now alleges that the governor's office not only withheld documents but engaged in "actively concealing them" and "conspiring with others known and unknown, to conceal public records" from him as well as "dealying the production of public records to interfere with the Petitioner’s prosecution of Andrews v. Board of Trustees of the Internal Improvement Fund (“BOT”), Case No. 2012 CA 859."

Lawyers for the governor and attorney general have repeatedly argued they have turned over all relevant documents and deny the allegations.

Democratic candidate for governor Charlie Crist sent a letter to Republican Gov. Rick Scott on Friday, urging him not to appeal the recent federal court ruling that found Florida's gay-marriage ban unconstitutional.

"By declaring the marriage ban finished you could discourage any future appeals and end the nightmare that loving same sex couples all across our state endure every single day, ending court battles that could drag on for months or years," Crist wrote.

Crist was Florida's Republican governor when voters approved the Constitutional ban on gay marriage. But he later expressed his support for marriage equality, and filed a legal brief in support of six same-sex couples seeking to marry in Florida.

"It is now apparent to me that the association's stance on educating low income students and access to choice in education is too conflicting with my own," Legg wrote in a letter to FSBA Executive Director Wayne Blanton. "It saddens me that the FSBA would take a position that looks to eliminate customization in education, an approach which is widely viewed to be essential to improving student learning."

The FSBA named Legg its Legislator of the Year on July 1.

His notification letter included a hand-written message from Blanton: "Thanks for all you have done for us. Your support of technology is greatly appreciated by all of the school districts."

Legg, a Trinity Republican and longtime supporter of school choice, declined the honor Friday.

"It is my sincere hope that the FSBA will abandon this hostile view toward low income students and customization," he wrote. "While in the past, we may not have agreed on every issue, we nevertheless maintained a healthy respect while working to resolve our differences for the betterment of all students. I hope the FSBA will redirect its efforts for the advancement of all our students and I look forward to working with you to that end."

The FSBA lawsuit takes aim at the tax credit scholarship program, which provides private-school scholarships to children from low-income families. The association's attorney claims the program conflicts with the state's Constitutionally mandated duty to provide a free and uniform system of public schools.

The state teachers union, PTA and the League of Women voters of Florida are also participating.

The coalition of voter groups that originally challenged maps draw during redistricting efforts in 2012 said they will also apeal newly draw maps approved earlier this month by a Leon County circuit court.

Lewis ruled that the new map would go into effect for the 2016 election. Both Brown and Webster are running for re-election now under the old boundary lines.

The coalition that originally challenged that map said the new one doesn't fix the issues they've raised and have criticized Lewis' ruling. They said the changes the Legislature approved to districts 5 and 10 didn't go far enough to fix the political gerrymandering.

The voter groups have now asked the state's First District Court of Appeal to look into Lewis's rulings. The coalition, which includes the League of Women Voters of Florida, the NAACP and Common Cause, makes it clear their fight is focused on changing the maps again in time for the 2016 election.

The First DCA has twice ruled against the voters groups on redistricting appeals but the Florida Supreme Court has twice overturned those rulings.

Incoming Florida House Speaker Steve Crisafulli has notified members of which weeks to block out of their schedules leading up to the 2015 session.

They will first gather Nov. 18, two weeks after the election, to have an organizational session. If Gov. Rick Scott wins re-election, this will be business as usual. But if Democrat Charlie Crist wages an upset, there will be many changes in the Capitol and the Republican-controlled Legislature will have even more to discuss.

Of course, either way the gubernatorial election goes, there will be some newly elected members (and some former members returning) joining the Legislature on Nov. 18 and for training the week of December 8.

Here are the committee weeks:

-The week of January 5

-The week of January 20 (Begins on Tuesday because the state observes Martin Luther King Day)

Nothing has dogged Miami Republican congressional candidate Carlos Curbelo on the campaign trail more than his refusal to disclose the clients of his media and public relations firm, Capitol Gains.

The company isn't registered in his name. He hasn't appeared in corporation records filed with the state of Florida since 2009, when Curbelo says he was advised by U.S. Senate attorneys to divest from his firm. Curbelo was state director for Florida Republican Senator George LeMieux from 2009-10.

But Curbelo listed himself as the company's president, owner or principal in various federal campaign contributions he made in 2013.

That year, Curbelo donated $500 in January to Miami Republican Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart and reported his occupation as president of Capitol Gains. In May, a $2,500 contribution to Republicans for Immigration Reform, a so-called "SuperPAC," listed him as Capitol Gains' owner. And in December, in a $2,600 contribution to his own congressional campaign, Curbelo wrote that he was a Capitol Gains "principal."

Curbelo readily acknowledges that he runs the firm he founded in 2002. His wife, Cecilia, who for the past five years as been listed as the corporation's sole managing member, stopped working in 2009 when the couple's first daughter, Sylvie Marie, was born.

The crew traipsing through the nooks and crannies of the historic Dade County Courthouse Thursday comprised circuit judges, elected officials and their aides –- all of them far too nattily attired for the task at hand.

They had come from more elegant quarters -– a judge’s chambers -– but appeared out of place in the courthouse’s damp basement, stepping gingerly over water pumps and around protective plastic sheeting.

“Don’t get near the poles,” Chief Judge Bertila Soto, clad in high heels, warned, “because there’s live wires.”

(The warning sign, in case the others missed it, was a message inscribed in black marker: “Shock. Danger!”)

Commissioner Esteban “Steve” Bovo initially declined an offer to walk into the former probate court division, closed because the level of carbon dioxide in the air was too high.

“Nah, you know what? I just kind of feel like I don’t want to,” Bovo joked. He eventually went in with the others.

In a restored courtroom, Circuit Judge Jacqueline Hogan Scola interrupted an attorney in trial to add to the banter.

“This is the Starship Enterprise,” she said of the courtroom in question. “The rest [of the building] is the exploded meteorite.”

“It’s beautiful,” Judge Jennifer Bailey said of the courthouse, which was completed in 1928. “It’s state of the art -– for 1930.”